Integrating Internet-Based and Teleconferencing Resources into On-Line Teaching

Posted on February 8, 2010 by Patty Salkin

Note: This is a continuing weblog describing my experiences teaching an on-line course in government ethics.

The on-line government ethics course this semester has already benefitted from a number of internet-based resources as well as teleconferencing.  With one of my early organizing goals to keep the “virtual class” as interactive as possible through the use of discussion boards and wikis available on TWEN, I also looked to see what other resources might be available on the Internet. To my surprise, there were a number of opportunities to integrate interactive ethics training into the course. 

For example, most state ethics agencies now offer on-line training for covered employees.  I contacted the NYS Commission on Public Integrity and they were agreeable to providing each of the students in the course with a user ID and password to enable students to take the Commission’s on-line training based on the ethics laws in New York.  This training was a wonderful introduction for the students to the types of issues typically covered in an ethics regulatory regime.  Another aspect of this on-line training was that at the end of each topical interval there was a quiz for participants to complete.  The entire training could take anywhere from 45 minutes to two hours to complete, depending upon whether users go straight through the course, or take the opportunity to click on links to actual statutes, regulations and opinions that go into further detail on the particular subject matter being discussed.  I asked the students to evaluate this training experience when they concluded the program. Their reactions were interesting.  Almost everyone commented that the training was beneficial and a good introduction for government employees about the law.  Many students commented that they thought this on-line training was too basic, yet, a number of these students also admitted that they were surprised to have gotten a lot of the quiz questions wrong.  From this, several students observed how nuanced government ethics laws really are, and that the appropriate course of action when it comes to ethics is not always so obvious. This was an excellent teaching opportunity to point out how even people who are “trained” in the law can make mistakes, how individuals may not fully understand the application of the law to their actions, and why it is important to carefully read the statutes and regulations and to critically analyze the facts and the law. 

Early in the semester we studied the difficulties surrounding the question of attorney-client privilege in the government context.  As luck would have it, ALI-ABA was promoting a one-hour practitioner-oriented teleconference on the attorney-client privilege.  Although this was not focused exclusively on government law practice, I thought it would be a good opportunity for the students to get a fuller understanding of the practical issues involved in application of the privilege.  Perhaps because I frequently volunteer to teach ALI-ABA courses, I asked and was given permission for my students to participate in the course at no charge.  ALI-ABA sent each student a password to access the lunch-time program.  While many students commented that they wished the program had focused on the privilege in the government context, a lot of students wrote in their program evaluation to me that the course was interesting and they reflected on how it related to both what we studied in government ethics and what they discussed in their professional responsibility and evidence classes.  This proved to be another good experience and opportunity to weave together ethics and professionalism and evidence along the continuum of the overall law school educational experience. It was practice oriented and it also covered doctrinal subject matter tested on the bar exam.

Lastly, for fun, the federal Office of Government Ethics (OGE) offers interactive games to reinforce serious ethics subject matter.  I provided students a link in the weekly course materials folders to two of OGE’s interactive crossword puzzles where users can test their knowledge of federal ethics laws. While I didn’t specifically require the students to complete the crossword puzzles, I used it as an optional and alternative on-line teaching tool.

The above are just some of the examples of the various tools available to supplement a virtual classroom learning experience.  Although I have not used them yet, there are government ethics training videos available on You-Tube and other web-based sources, and a number of states post on-line the oral arguments before their high court, providing yet another great resource for many different subject areas.

Patty Salkin, Albany Law School

Filed under: Best Practices & Curriculum, Best Practices for Institutional Effectiveness, Technology | Tagged: , | 2 Comments »

BEST PRACTICES AND LAND USE LAW: a “natural” merger?

Posted on February 5, 2010 by Mary Lynch

A new article just posted to SSRN examines Best Practices in the field of land use law.  The article, “Practically Grounded: Convergence of Land Use Pedagogy and Best Practices” is forthcoming in the Journal of Legal Education. (One can downloand at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1540713). 

The authors (my colleague Dean Patricia Salkin from Albany Law School and Professor John Nolon from Pace Law School) are among the most prolific land use law scholars in the nation.  I am delighted that their current scholarship venture will add to the growing body of literature on Best Practices as it offers unique perspectives and ideas that we can all learn from.  Even though I have no experience in, nor have ever taught,  land use law,  I found the article contained lots of little gems and good ideas for those of us who teach in other subject areas or who are collaborating with colleagues on Best Practices initiatives.  

Salkin and Nolon’s  article begins with an examination of the changing dynamics in the field of land use and sustainable community development law, explaining how this provides a unique opportunity to rethink the way in which faculty prepare law students to practice law in this area. The authors explain how this paradigm shift converges with the growing momentum of the Best Practices movement, and observes that a “perfect storm” is present and a unique opportunity exists through the application of many “Best Practices” concepts for land use law faculty to lead the academy in reinventing curriculum and teaching strategies to better prepare students for the practice of law.

The article also reviews the history of the Best Practices movement, and makes the case as to why land use should be the “poster child” for best practices. This is followed by a discussion of an empirical survey conducted by the authors in 2008 of land use law professors that examined, among other things, the opportunities to apply Best Practices to the subject of land use law. The article offers innovative examples of teaching methods that can be effectively utilized within the confines of the traditional classroom, using the land use law course as a model, as well as an example of how the land use law course can be used across the curriculum as a Best Practices capstone experience.

 Again using the content of the land use course, the article concludes with the observation that the traditional approach to teaching can be converted into exciting opportunities that engage student learners, stretch the limits of student creativity, instill a sense of professionalism, and, consistent with the findings and recommendations of the Best Practices Report, prepare students to be more effective attorneys.

 The authors welcome and invite discussion of their article here among those of us interested in exploring Best Practices.

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Updating Institutional Responses to Best Practices

Posted on February 2, 2010 by Mary Lynch

St. John’s U Law School Professor Gina Calabrese posted this query to the clinic listserv:  

“I’d like to hear from other clinicians whose schools are taking
steps to study and implement the Best Practices report.  What
is being done, what issues are being raised?” 

I think this would make a good public discussion.  We know that U of Dayton has created the “Lawyer as Problem Solver” Program (http://law.udayton.edu/prospectivestudents).  And,everyone has heard about Washington & Lee’s 3rd year reform. (http://law.wlu.edu/thirdyear).  

However, these schools are not the only ones engaged in change. Much energy and work and thinking and reform is occurring without fanfare or media attention – so here is your chance to share news about your school!

Let’s see if we can get at least 50 schools to report! I’ll start with ALBANY LAW: 

ALBANY - the Dean has established a Center for Excellence in Law Teaching to document ongoing reform and to support teaching and curriculum enhancement.  ( see www.teachinglawstudents.com and click on Albany Law Initiatives or go straight to http://www.albanylaw.edu/sub.php?navigation_id=1717 ).

Filed under: Best Practices & Curriculum, Catalysts For Change | 3 Comments »

On-Line Discussion Boards Create a New Arena for Engaged Learning Environments

Posted on January 27, 2010 by Patty Salkin

What’s better than the Socratic Method to engage all students in a course?  On-line discussion boards.

One of the challenges in creating the virtual classroom is to strive for students to substitute time that would have been spent sitting in a seat in an actual classroom for time spent engaged in the discussion on-line.  In addition to viewing short slide presentations with audio, and participating in occasional other on-line instruction (for example, this week the students were registered for and participated in a 45 minute on-line ethics training program developed by the NYS Commission on Public Integrity; and they were registered for a one hour ALI-ABA teleconference on the attorney-client privilege), the remainder of our instruction hours for the week are spent on the discussion boards.

So far I have opted to post three questions per week, and I have required the students to respond to at least two of the three questions, and then post replies to at two postings made by their colleagues (requiring 4 postings in total).  With 22 students enrolled in the course, it would be near impossible in a seminar of this size to actively engage every student in every class hour.  With the on-line discussion board, however, each and every student is an engaged learner who must participate in the class discussion.  In other words, no one gets a “bye” for the weekly class reading, and everyone must learn to be reflective, analytical and articulate in the written postings they make to the discussion boards.  Not only do I read the postings, but every class member reads the postings as well.  By week two, I realized the power of the discussion boards.

The two discussions I opened were:

1)    Based on Chapter 2, it is fair to conclude that defining exactly “who” is the client of the government lawyer is a difficult and challenging task, yet one that it is extremely important (at least in terms of confidentiality of communications which we will discuss in another posting).  Please respond for making a case that one of the following should be appropriately viewed as the client of the General Counsel to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and explain why: 1) The Governor; 2) The Commissioner of DEC; 3) The Counsel to the Governor; 4) A high ranking official within the agency other than the Commissioner; 5) Anyone in the Agency who sits down for a conversation with the Agency Counsel; 6) The public; or 7) Other (be specific). Is your answer the same if the attorney is not the DEC General Counsel, but rather an Assistant Counsel who reports to a deputy counsel who reports to the general counsel?  What if you work in the attorney general’s office and your job, according to the New York Executive Law, is to represent the State?

2)    From reading both Chapter 12 and the article in the folder for week 2, it is apparent that the federal courts are in conflict as to whether a government attorney-client privilege exists. This is an issue that will likely get before the U.S. Supreme Court some day. Please explain why you believe there should or should not be an attorney-client privilege. Your answer may consider the following: Does it matter whether the underlying conversations and litigation involve civil or criminal matters? If a privilege exists, does it belong to the government official or some other office/agency in government? What type of legal and regulatory arguments can you make to support your policy position?

These questions were directed, yet open ended enough to allow students to craft carefully thought-out responses and to challenge and engage students with differing perspectives and interpretations.  In the classroom, students may have responded with short answers in a sentence or two and full explanations may have had to be painstakingly extracted. Using the on-line forum, however, I received outstanding responses that demonstrated students did the reading, applied the applicable laws and policies, and considered the legal and policy challenges in reaching conclusions.  Their responses ranged from one full paragraph to four or five paragraphs.

In short, the discussion boards are proving to be an excellent teaching tool.  

Patty Salkin, Albany Law School

Filed under: Best Practices & Curriculum, Teaching Methodology | Tagged: , | 7 Comments »

“I’d like to thank the Academy…”: Using Movies in the Law School Classroom

Posted on January 22, 2010 by Justin Myers

The conversation that follows reminds me that when we, those supportive of the Best Practice model, use words like “innovation” and “engagement,” what we really mean is effective innovation and efficient engagement. When venturing away from the traditional delivery methods in the name of engagement and innovation, the most effective and efficient delivery methods must be accompanied by clearly articulated educational goals.

On a Tuesday afternoon, early in the new semester, Professor Hillary Farber posted a short and direct question to the Law Clinic Listserv. She asked, “Does anyone have any good discussion questions for this film [12 Angry Men] you would be willing to share?

 These are the responses that were shared:
(please feel free to add your own comments) Read more »

Filed under: Teaching Methodology, Technology | Leave a Comment »

Course Design – Technology Meets Substance in On-Line Curriculum Development

Posted on January 20, 2010 by Patty Salkin

After setting course learning outcomes for the on-line government ethics course, I had to revise my syllabus to better match my goals and desired outcomes mindful of the on-line format, and I had to develop creative strategies for creating a vibrant virtual discussion that would satisfactorily create a functional equivalent of an in-person classroom discussion.

To be honest, this was easier than I thought it would be using the functionality of TWEN.  I selected one soft cover book as the course text, and have supplemented that with readings mostly available on-line or in the public domain that are posted to the course site in weekly course resource folders.

I typically require students to complete assignments in my courses, and I wanted to find a way that these tasks could add to the vibrancy of the course by being shared with all  participants rather than being e-mailed only to me using the TWEN assignment drop-box. At the end of December, TWEN added a Wiki function to the site, and this was the perfect opportunity.  Each student was asked to sign-up for one state that they will follow through the semester.  I set up a series of Wikis where students will be posting short narratives and links to statutes, regulations and opinions from their state about subject matters we will be studying that particular week.  All of the states the students selected appear on the Wiki page for a given week, and each student accesses the Wiki and inputs the information for their state. So, for example, in week two, students have to merely find and post the on-line links to their state ethics commission, ethics laws and lobbying laws.  In week three, students will have to actually critically read and start to parse aspects of the state statutes in order to answer a series of questions about their state ethics commission.  The assignment reads as follows:

Using the state laws from the state you have selected for the semester (note: the following 10 states do NOT have ethics commissions – Arizona, Idaho, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Virginia and Wyoming), please find the applicable provisions dealing with the composition of the state ethics commission. Under your state listing in this wiki, please answer the questions below:

1. How many people are on the commission (board)?
2. Who appoints the members of the commission (board)?
3. What is the term of office for members?
4. Are there criteria/qualifications/disqualifications for members?
5. Are there provisions for removal of members? How is the chair of the commission (board) selected?
7. Who appoints the executive director of the commission (board)?
8. Is the executive director appointed for a term?
9. Does the law provide for removal of the executive director?
10. Does the commission (board) have subpoena power?
11. Does the commission have jurisdiction over both executive and legislative branch officers and employees; municipal employees; lobbyists?

Provide the on-line link to the applicable provisions of state law that support your summary.

When completed, the class will have a 23-state comparative overview of the differences and similarities of state statutes on this topic which will be the basis of a question on our Discussion Board (I’ll write more about the Discussion Boards in a future posting).

For those interested, my colleague Darlene Cardillo, our Instructional Technologist at Albany Law School has posted a summary of week one of the course from a technology perspective on her blog here. The results of our pre-course student survey about their familiarity with on-line learning and with TWEN can be viewed here, you can read about the only in-person class, a one hour orientation here,.

Patty Salkin, Albany Law School

Filed under: Best Practices & Curriculum, Best Practices, Outcomes & Assessment Techniques, Teaching Methodology, Technology, Uncategorized | Tagged: , | 5 Comments »

Support for Empirical Research on Teaching/Assessment

Posted on January 18, 2010 by andicurcio

The Need for Scholarship About Law Teaching and Learning

When we teach or assess differently, we often wonder: does this actually make a difference?  Does it improve student learning?  If so, does it improve all students’ learning, or does it only help a particular segment of students?  What do students think about this different methodology?  Does it motivate them to work harder and learn more deeply?    If my school has a “performance gap” between students of color and white students, or between men and women, do these different methods lessen or eliminate that gap?  All those questions, and more, can be explored empirically.  

SALT Website Identifies Resources For Scholarship, Especially Empirical Scholarship, on Teaching and Assessment Issues

One significant problem  is that few of us have had any social science training and thus we do not feel equipped to engage in an empirical scholarly exploration of the impact of our teaching or assessment.   Yet hard data is a very persuasive tool as we try to effectuate change.  For these reasons, The Society of American Law Teachers [SALT] has developed two resources for faculty members who want to engage in empirical research involving the “scholarship of teaching and learning.” 

 On the SALT website, go to “SALT at Work” and click on “Issues in Legal Education”.  There you will see a link to a list of academics who have agreed to be social science collaborators.  These academic collaborators will help you design, implement and interpret an empirical study involving law teaching and assessment issues. 

Also at the same website, you will find a  link to an “assessment working group” list serv.  That list serve  is comprised of legal academics who want to support each other in doing teaching and assessment research, especially empirical research.  It’s a great group of people who will help you work through issues in planning, developing or writing articles about your teaching and assessment methods, and is especially a good resource for those delving into empirical research.  

In sum, resources exist to help you as you begin to explore the scholarship opportunities that arise simply from your every day teaching and assessment work.

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Setting Goals and Evaluation for an On-Line Course

Posted on January 17, 2010 by Patty Salkin

With the recent focus on outcomes for learning, I decided to provide students taking the first on-line course at Albany Law School with written goals for the semester.  The following was posted for the students:

COURSE GOALS:

By the end of the course, students who participate fully should be able to:

1)    APPLY acquired knowledge of government ethics laws in general, and regulations that apply specifically to government lawyers, statewide and nationally to challenges facing individuals who work in the public sector at any level of government in any state;

2)    RECOGNIZE & EVALUATE differing perspectives surrounding the public policy goals and dynamics of regulating the conduct of public officials and employees, and the roles of the various oversight agencies involved in the education, enforcement and prosecution of public actors for alleged civil and/or criminal wrongdoing;

3)    EXAMINE CRITICALLY  laws (existing and proposed), policies, systems and structures which govern  those who work in the public sector as well as those in the private sector who interact with government employees to identify applicable laws, loopholes and opportunities; and

4)    DEMONSTRATE COLLABORATION/COLLEAGIALITY AND PROFESSIONALISM through participation in the active on-line and team learning aspects of the course which will be essential to effective client counseling and representation and/or negotiation in the development of ethics laws and regulations.

Naturally, students want to know how they will be evaluated.  This required a lot of consideration for an on-line class.  When I previously taught the course I told the students I expected that they follow the Law School’s published attendance policy, and that class participation and completion of assignments would count towards their grade.  Since the course was taught seminar style, in lieu of an exam, students were required to submit a 20-25 page research paper at the end of the semester. The paper was weighted significantly in calculating grades. 

After reflecting on the goals to make sure that the students were being evaluated appropriately based on the desired outcomes, I developed the following grading rubric:

Assessment/Grading:  Your performance will be assessed throughout the semester as you participate in on-line discussions, and complete wikis and other assignments.  The amount of time you spend on-line in the course site and its various component assignments, combined with the quality of your postings which should reflect the knowledge and skills you acquire as the semester goes on, will be incorporated the feedback you receive during the semester as well as in your final grade.

Effort reflected by time on line                                                                  25%

Completion of all assignments and discussions                                  25%

(quality demonstrating reading and reflection of materials and other student comments)

Accurate and comprehensive completion of                                         25%   

Wiki assignments

Accurate and comprehensive completion of group                              25%

project

In future postings I will describe the discussion boards, the use of wikis and the group project.  To determine time on line, which is the closest I could come to an attendance policy for an on-line course, I told students I would view the “activity” reports provided by TWEN.  I cautioned students that I would be able to tell who simply logged on to the TWEN site and then left for a couple of hours with the browser open to make it appear as though they were actively engaged in reviewing information on the site.

Patty Salkin, Albany Law School

Filed under: Best Practices, Outcomes & Assessment Techniques, Technology | Tagged: , | 3 Comments »

Who are the “Best Law Teachers”?

Posted on January 14, 2010 by Justin Myers

In 2008, Michael Hunter Schwartz, of Washburn Law School, began soliciting nominations for a study of the Best Law Teachers in this country based on Ken Bain’s book, What the Best College Teachers Do (2004).  Professor Schwartz has recently enlisted Best Practices Blog contributors Sophie Sparrow of Franklin Pierce and Gerry Hess of Gonzaga as co-authors and investigators.

While more than 250 nominations have been collected thus far, there is only a short time left to nominate others at “Best Law Teachers.”  Deadline for nominations is April 1, 2010 (no joke).  Professor Schwartz and company have already begun studying several of the Best Law Teachers and expect to continue their examinations this spring. 

For general information about the study, a list of nominees, and a link to the nomination form, please go to http://washburnlaw.edu/bestlawteachers/.

Filed under: Catalysts For Change, Teaching Methodology | Leave a Comment »

Objection! Helping Clinical Students Practice Trial Skills

Posted on January 14, 2010 by Justin Myers

For the better part of the last decade, students in Albany Law’s Domestic Violence Prosecution Hybrid Clinic have used a computer program called “You Be the Judge” to help them sharpen their evidentiary objections.  It takes about forty-five minutes for students to complete a simulated trail during which they must object to various pieces of evidence and/or testimony using the Federal Rules of Evidence.  The student must choose when to object and write an explanation for the objection in the time allotted.

The appeal of the program is that it offered a simple and entertaining way to practice trial skills without the need for elaborate hypotheticals or the cooperation of fellow students. However, the game also had several drawbacks.  It only worked with very old operating systems. Correct answers were not always accepted if the student didn’t word them exactly how the game did, and the game offered limited feedback as to why answers where right and others were wrong.

We are now in search of a replacement program that would similarly allow students to practice their evidentiary objections.  Ideally the program would be based on the New York Rules of Evidence, but the Federal Rules would suffice. 

What similar programs do others use?  One newer program is the “Objection!” program (http://www.objection.com/products.html) has anyone used it?  Would anyone recommend it?  Thanks for any suggestions you could provide.

Filed under: Technology | 2 Comments »

Organizing Technology to Teach On-Line

Posted on January 12, 2010 by Patty Salkin

There are many technical issues to explore when setting up an on-line course.  The most important resource with respect to all aspects of technical course design was our superstar instructional technologist at Albany Law School, Darlene Cardillo (here is a link to her technology blog:   http://albanylawtech.wordpress.com). What follows are some of the important issues explored and lessons learned:

1 – What platform was available to “host” the course?  I had used Blackboard in the past, but Albany Law School did not have access to this.  In the end, TWEN was selected after Darlene’s recommendation.  I had some comfort with TWEN, having used some of its functionality last semester, but I definitely needed a tutorial on the possibilities it had for an on-line course. My next posting will provide details on how I am using the TWEN tools to deliver the course.

2 – What other software and hardware did I need? After deciding that I would not be having students log-in for live video chats (this eliminated the need for a webcam/camera in my computer and the need to download software (such as Skype), I did decide to try using slide presentations with my voice over to convey certain information for some weeks. To accomplish this, Darlene set me up with Adobe Presenter and a microphone.  I also got a small recorder that saves recordings as mp3 files for easy uploading to the course site.  This will allow me to post “podcasts” of interviews I might conduct during the semester.

3 – Practice.  I like the Adobe Presenter software since it allows me to record audio one slide at a time and save it.  I didn’t count on the amount of time it would take me to record the audio.  For week one I had 17 slides.  I figured it would take me 25-30 minutes to record the audio.  Wrong.  It took me 90 minutes.  I realized that when I went to record a “lasting memorial” of my words, I sought greater perfection than the more informal patterns of speech in front of the classroom.  I re-recorded individual slides more times that I care to relate.  I resisted though the temptation to “script” the slides.  I thought it would take too much time and my presentations/discussions in class are not “scripted” as such.  I wanted to words and speech patterns to seem real, yet polished.  The ninety minute investment was worth it – except, I did not save the presentation correctly, lost it, and had to start over again.  Hard lesson in what not to do!

4- Size of the files for posting.  Generally I have not had problems opening pdf files I have placed in the weekly resource files.  However, some difficulty was experienced opening the pdf of the slide presentation made with Adobe Presenter.  I may not have compressed the file when I saved it.  It was also advised that Adobe 9 was required to open the document. Aaron Cabbage at Westlaw who works on TWEN design/development has also recommended saving the slides in the future through Slide Share (http://www.slideshare.net ) and then posting a link from the TWEN site.  I may try that next.

Patty Salkin, Albany Law School

Filed under: Technology | Tagged: , | 2 Comments »

Wegner’s Thoughts on Legal Education Reform: Legal Education’s Wicked Problems

Posted on January 9, 2010 by jwegner

At long last, I’ve completed (and Rutgers Law Review as published) an expanded essay on my own thoughts regarding the Carnegie Foundation’s study of legal education.  The essay is entitled ”Reframing Legal Education’s Wicked Problems” and is available at SSRN (http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1533778) and on the Rutgers Law Review website (http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~review/vol61n4.php).  I’ve tried to facilitate further discussion of several facets of the Carnegie study work (particularly by incorporating more excerpts of interviews with faculty and students about what is meant by “thinking like a lawyer” and how the related skills are taught).  I’m also happy to be able to contribute at some length to thinking about why upper division curriculum reform is so difficult, why it is so needed, and how it might be approached, particularly by taking into account issues relating to personal and professional identity that face students of this generation.   An abstract follows. –Judith Wegner (judith_wegner@unc.edu)

Abstract:

The essay, by one of the authors of Educating Lawyers (the “Carnegie Report”) offers fresh insights as to why legal education reform is so difficult, drawing upon the theory of “wicked problems” increasingly used in public policy, engineering and a variety of other fields. It demonstrates the application of that theory with reference to the oft-told tale of Rumpelstiltskin, and draws from that tale key lessons that can be used by those seeking to create a new prospectus for legal education in coming years. It then illuminates four “wicked problems: that have plagued legal education for years: how responsibility should be allocated for lawyer preparation; why change in content alone does not result in enduring improvements in legal education; whether “thinking like a lawyer” has a continuing place in legal education; and how the upper division can be fruitfully improved. In illuminating these problems, it also offers suggestions for how they might be approached and resolved.

After providing background on the characteristics of “wicked problems” and how they can best be approached, the essay focuses on “commonplaces” that underlie professional work and accordingly should drive professional education (including legal education), thereby providing a fresh framework for actionable steps to improve legal education and the practice of law.It next S discusses the need to attend both to visible and invisible dimensions of problems in order to shape meaningful solutions and explains the importance of often unrecognized dynamics of learning and teaching as major forces that play crucial roles in legal education and curriculum reform.

The essay then discusses the power of naming, offering an in-depth look at the nuances of “thinking like a lawyer” as understood by students and faculty members interviewed at sixteen diverse law schools in connection with the site visits that informed the Carnegie Report. It stresses the specific ways that first year case-dialogue instruction forces students to deal with uncertainty, one of the critical dimensions of professional practice, and unpacks the notion of “thinking like a lawyer” in ways that should prove illuminating for students and helpful for faculty members who seek to help students understand the resulting changes in epistemology that are so central to the first year of law school. It also considers the nature of the “case-dialogue method” and explains the ways in which that classic teaching technique plays a critical role in building students‘ abilities to think analytically.

Finally, the essay considers one of legal education‘s most intransigent “wicked problems”: the upper division curriculum. Using insights from the theory of “wicked problems,”The essay endeavors to explain why upper division curriculum reform is so difficult. It then offers four strategies for “renegotiating” existing assumptions and practices in order to improve the upper division curriculum. These strategies (including purposeful redesign on the large scale, rethinking content, rethinking pedagogy, and re-balancing teaching and learning responsibilities) each of which are very likely need to be used in concert in order for meaningful improvements to occur. In particular, this portion of the essay incorporates insights from educational psychology and work on professional identity development in graduate students to stress the ways in which effective advanced curricular innovations should attend to the challenges faced by the current generation of students who, much more than those in past decades, face challenges in navigating changes in personal identity at the same time they confront the need to develop a sense of professional identity before leaving law school.

Filed under: Best Practices & Curriculum, First Year Law School Innovations, Teaching Methodology | 1 Comment »

Getting Ready for On-Line Teaching

Posted on January 9, 2010 by Patty Salkin

This semester I will be teaching the first all on-line course at Albany Law School. The topic is government ethics.  The desire to experiment with the course format and new technology is due in part to the fact that each spring semester we send students to Washington, DC for a semester in government program (in addition to placing students in New York’s capital city) and all students in the full time semester in government experience are required, among other things, to take the government ethics course.  In the past we have been fortunate to have been able to use distance learning facilities at George Washington University School of Law to have our students participate in the class using the cameras in their classroom and the distance learning facilities at Albany Law School.  With the advances in technology, and my experiences teaching on-line professional development courses for lawyers and planners through Rutger’s, the time seemed right to experiment with the government ethics course for our JD students.  Over the course of the next several weeks I will post entries to explain how the course has been designed, the different ways in which technology has been incorporated into the curriculum, some of the lessons learned in terms of design and technology, and I will report “real time” on both teacher and student reactions to various apsects of the course.  Your comments and suggestions about improvements to the course design/approach are welcome as adjustments can be made along the way.  

Patty Salkin, Albany Law School

Filed under: Technology | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

AALS Conference ABA Accreditation Standards Panel – Requiring Law Schools to Measure Student Learning

Posted on January 8, 2010 by Mary Lynch

Today at 4pm,  Standards Review Committee presented on the current draft  revisions to the ABA accreditation standards  and according to the conference materials on ”this directional change in legal education. “  I was delighted to hear Professor Margaret Martin Barry introduce  the panel presentation with a quote from Roy Stuckey urging the Committee to focus on the importance of reflection (which you can read about in the last post and which Roy posted on the ABA site).   Dean Steve Bahls, Chair of the Standards Review Committee, described the process which led to the current version of the proposal. He reminded the audience “that the train has not yet left the station” with respect to outcomes based accreditation and that the current draft of the proposed standards has not even reached the point to be published for comment. Instead, he insists that the “train” is still being built with respect to how to revise accreditation; he  invited written comments on the proposed standards by March 15th.  

Other panelists provided examples of the University of Dayton’s Law School’s outcomes and assessment process and of the finalized outcomes-based process used to accredit Pharmacy schools. Former AALS president Nancy Rogers expressed concern about the cost of requiring outcomes-based learning in this economic environment and queried about whether the “value added” was worth it. 

 The floor was then open for questions.  Questions ranged from “What’s the problem with the way things are?” to asking the review commission to focus on professional development of faculty as teachers.   Professor Elizabeth Schneider, chair of the the Curriculum Committee of the ABA,  expressed concern about the committee’s focus on ensuring summative assessment of outcomes as opposed to formative assessment which is the focus of much of the exciting work being done currently in legal education.  I expressed concern about the recent revision’s conflation of simulation courses and live-client clinics and encouraged the committee to review Roy’s comments on this issue. 

Bottom line - whether the train is in the station ready to leave or being assembled car by car – now is the time for all good folks to weigh in on standard revisions.

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Stuckey Comments on Proposed Revisions to ABA Standards

Posted on December 23, 2009 by Mary Lynch

As you know from earlier posts,  the ABA Standards Review Committee is having a meeting on its proposed revisions in January during the AALS conference. 

Best Practices author Roy Stuckey has submitted comments to the Committee (copied below).  What do you think of Roy’s comments? of the revisions? Should the Best Practices Implementation committee take a position? 

MEMORANDUM

TO:     Standards Review Committee, ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar

FROM:   Roy Stuckey, Professor Emeritus, Univ. of South Carolina School of Law 

DATE:  December 21, 2009 

RE:  Outcome Measures for U.S. Law Schools 

I offer these comments about the Student Leaning Outcomes Committee’s report for discussion at your January 8-9, 2010, meeting.  I am sorry that I will not be able to attend the meeting.  As explained in more detail below, my suggestions are:

1.         The Committee should either delete or substantially modify proposed S303(a)(4). 

2.         The proposed Standards should give more emphasis to the development of self-reflective skills. 

3.         The Committee should clarify the meaning of S302(b)(2)(iii).

4.         The Committee should reconsider the placement and description of skills in Alternative Two of proposed S302(b)(2)(iii).

My reasons for making these suggestions are explained in the following sections: 

1.         If adopted, the current language in proposed S303(a)(4) could be more harmful than helpful to legal education.  It says:  A law school shall offer a curriculum that requires every student to complete satisfactorily at least one appropriately supervised learning experience in either (i) a substantial simulated exercise that engages students in performances of professional skills involving a type of case or problem that practitioners encounter; or (ii) a live client clinic or field placement.

The potential harm here is in the implicit suggestion that ABA-mandated and school self-identified skills could be acquired in a single simulated exercise or a single clinical course.  Anyone who has tried to teach professional skills knows this is impossible.  Further, this language also suggests that simulated exercises, live client clinics, and field placement are equally effective and efficient at teaching the same lessons, including professional skills instruction.  This is a misconception.  Each method of instruction has unique strengths.  There is some overlap, but there are also significant differences, as my co-authors and I point out in Best Practices for Legal Education (2007) at pages 168-173, 180-184, 189-193, and 198-200. 

I submit that the accreditation Standards would be improved if this proposal is withdrawn.  Proposed S303(b)(1) (which is a modified version of existing S301(b)(1)) should be retained:  A law school shall provide substantial opportunities to students for (1) live-client clinics or other real-life experiences; . . . .

 I think we all know, as the Carnegie Report concluded, that law schools should provide multiple opportunities for students to engage in supervised law practice, but, unfortunately, we also know that most law schools would resist a mandate to do so from the ABA. 

I wish the committee would reconsider the recommendation of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Learning Outcomes to include a standard requiring law schools to offer a curriculum that requires all students to participate in multiple courses in which they perform well-supervised authentic legal work on realistic legal problems designed to encourage reflection by students on their professional experiences, the values and responsibilities of the legal profession, and the development of the ability to assess one’s own performances, levels of competence, and professional judgment.

 While not mandating any particular method for accomplishing the desired learning outcomes, this proposal makes it clear that students must participate in multiple courses in order to become adequately self-reflective about their professional development.  The importance of being self-reflective is discussed in the following section.

2.         An earlier version of the Learning Outcomes Committee’s report proposed adding the following language to S301, which describes the overall objectives of legal education:  S301(c) A law school shall strive to produce graduates who are reflective practitioners and who have the capacity and motivation to pursue expertise throughout their careers.

Language similar to this is in existing S302(b)(1): A law school shall offer substantial opportunities for live-client or other real-life practice experiences, appropriately supervised and designed to encourage reflection by students on their experiences and on the values and responsibilities of the legal profession, and the development of one’s ability to assess his or her performance and level of competence.

Of course, the development of self-reflective skills can be enhanced by educational experiences other than live-client or other real-life practice experiences, so I agreed with the initial decision to move the language into S301.  In the new draft, however, proposed S301(c) has disappeared, and Interpretation 303-3 was added on page 4:  I303-3.  A law school’s curriculum should encourage reflection by students on their values and experiences and on the values and responsibilities of the legal profession, as well as the development of one’s ability to assess his or her performance, professionalism and level of competence.

It is clear that the Committee wants law schools to produce reflective practitioners, as it should.  I do not understand the politics that resulted in the decision to move this language out of a Standard and into an Interpretation.  The skill of self-reflection should at least be on the list of mandated outcomes in S302(b)(2)(I), if not in S301. 

This is what the authors of the Carnegie Report said about the value of self-reflection:

Practical judgment depends on complex traditions of living, which can only come alive through apprenticeship experiences with exemplars of inherited judgment and skill.  Thus the apprenticeship of skill takes on critical aspects of the apprenticeship of professional identity and ethical meaning.

 For this reason, professional schools cannot directly teach students to be competent in any and all situations: rather the essential goal of professional schools must be to form practitioners who are aware of what it takes to become competent in their chosen domain and to equip them with the reflective capacity to pursue genuine expertise.  [Carnegie Report, p. 173]

Experience in the Daniel Webster Scholars’ Program in New Hampshire reinforces this point.  In that program, which allows graduates to be admitted to the New Hampshire bar without taking the bar examination, bar examiners, judges, and lawyers assess the portfolios of students enrolled in the Program to determine whether those students have the necessary knowledge, skills, and values to become competent lawyers.

The Director of the Program, John Garvey, reported at the Assessment Conference in September that the first thing those experts look at when assessing a student’s portfolio is the students’ self-critiques and self-reflections, because they recognize that a critical component of an effective and responsible lawyer is the ability to identify what one does not know and the ability and desire to achieve the necessary level of expertise.

If the development of self-reflective skills should indeed be the essential goal of legal education, it should be among the mandatory outcomes in S301 or S302, not just in an interpretation of S303.

3.         I am confused by the phrase “sufficient depth and breadth” in both alternatives to proposed S302(b)(2)(iii).                                  

S302(b)(2) requires “proficiency as an entry level practitioner,” thus, S302(b)(2)(iii) as proposed would read:  The learning outcomes shall be consistent with and support the stated mission and goals of the law school.  The learning outcomes shall include:  proficiency as an entry level practitioner in: [Alternative One]  a sufficient depth and breadth of other professional skills that the law school identifies as necessary for effective, responsible and ethical participation in the legal profession.

It does not seem to me that the phrase “sufficient depth and breadth” has any meaning.  If it does, please explain what it means.   If it does not, please remove it.

4.         I am also confused by the placement of the list of skills in Alternative Two to S302(b)(2)(iii).   . . . , which shall include trial and appellate advocacy, alternative methods of dispute resolution, counseling, interviewing, negotiating, factual investigation, organization and management of legal work, and drafting. 

If these skills are under consideration as mandatory outcomes, why put them here instead of as additional skills to consider adding to S302(b)(2)(I)? 

If the goal of the Committee is to produce a list of the basic skills that every lawyer should possess upon graduation from law school, I would note that very few lawyers practice in appellate courts, so appellate advocacy is a strange candidate for a mandatory list, as are trial advocacy skills. 

I encourage the committee to continue trying to come up with a list of skills that all law school graduates should have, but I would also point out that the MacCrate Report’s statement of skills and values does not recommend that law school graduates should possess entry level proficiency in lawyering skills.  Rather, the MacCrate Report uses language like, “a lawyer should be familiar with the skills and concepts involved in [a particular skill].”  Perhaps the committee should use similar language with regard to appellate advocacy, trial advocacy, and other skills in which entry level proficiency is not necessary. 

Thank you for considering my comments.  Good luck on your continuing work.

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